


A crumb of cheese

by RedStarFiction



Category: Outlander & Related Fandoms, Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-04
Updated: 2015-12-04
Packaged: 2018-05-04 22:45:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5351180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedStarFiction/pseuds/RedStarFiction





	A crumb of cheese

“A ‘date-night’?”  
“Yeah, like you know, you go and do something together, just the two of you …”  
Bree gestured, trying to think of something and laughed at the thoroughly scandalised expression on her father’s face.  
“Da! I didn’t mean ‘that’! Just spend time together doing something nice.”  
Jamie nodded to himself. It seemed like a sweet thing to do, albeit a wee bit odd. A man and wife didna need to set time aside to be around each other, they had the nights and the early mornings and spaces snatched from the working day in between.  
“Ye think she’d like that then? A date-night?”  
Bree grinned at him  
“I think she’d love it.”  
“Weel… ah … maybe a fishing trip?”  
“No Da, it has to be something she’d like too.”  
“Picking herbs?”  
Jamie offered uncertainly and Bree shook her head, laughing at the thought of Jamie squatting along her mother’s rows of seedlings, being scolded for choosing the wrong leaves or buds.  
“I was thinking more like dinner and wine – maybe a picnic?”  
Bree offered gently and Jamie’s face lit up realising that food could be involved.  
“Och aye, I can do that.”  
*  
Jamie found Claire in her garden and although he had intended to go through with his plan straight away he found himself stopping to watch her. She was inspecting some wee green shrub, her hair mostly pinned back, the curve of her neck pale against the woollen scarf about her shoulders. As he watched her, she caught her thumb on a hidden thorn and called the shrub a ‘dirty green bugger’. Jamie had never known exactly why his wife’s foul language pleased him so much. There was just something so wild and reckless and self-assured about the way Claire spoke, and it sent a thrill of longing up his spine to hear it.  
Jamie shook himself out of his reverie and strode towards her, purposefully composing himself and setting his face to a mask of displeasure.  
“Sassenach?”  
She looked up at his stern countenance and scowled back at him before turning her attention to her thumb again.  
“What?”  
Dhia! She was so fierce! Jamie felt his lip tremble with the urge to smile but fought it down  
“Might I trouble ye for a word? Now.”  
He kept his voice level, stern and saw her look up at him warily.  
“You may.”  
“Come wi’ me.”  
He turned and strode toward the house, briefly glancing over his shoulder to ensure that she was following. Unlike most men he knew, it was always a concern that his wife would simply ignore his order and choose to carry on with what she was doing until she felt like humouring him, but he was glad to see that today she was picking her way across the garden to follow him, though she didn’t look pleased about it.  
“Jamie, what is going on?”  
“Ye’ll see.”  
“You could just bloody well tell me!”  
“Sassenach, I wish to show ye somethin’ and hear ye thought’s on it.”  
Jamie said firmly, holding out his hand to her and helping her carefully across the last of the delicate planting.  
“Well whatever it is you’re clearly put out about it. If it’s the shrunken socks, I blame the wool! It must have been a badly woven batch to shrink like that …”  
Jamie’s shoulders began to shake with supressed laughter at her indignant babble as they entered the house.  
“Through there!”  
He said, forcing the mirth down again and pointing through towards the kitchen, his face carefully blank. Claire squinted at him but obligingly stepped through  
“If I find a bloody … Oh!”  
She stopped suddenly in the doorway and pressed a hand to her mouth.  
“Oh Jamie! Was this you? Why?”  
Jamie stepped close behind her and gently turned her around to face him, wrapping his arms around her.  
“Aye it was me and as to the why, does a man need a reason to treat his wife well?”  
“No but … I mean …”  
Claire twisted in his embrace and gestured to the table  
“This is so lovely.”  
Jamie beamed at her and stooped to kiss her shoulder  
“I’m glad, now take a seat.”  
Claire stepped into the room and trailed her finger along the edge of the table. Jamie had laid out a modest but beautiful spread of cheese, bread, apples, ham and an assortment of other things from their larder. The table itself was covered with the pea-green table cloth Claire had chosen on a trip into market once as was reserved for particularly special occasions and at each end, a silver candelabra stood, casting a warm glow across the picnic and softly lighting the room. Freshly picked flowers stood in a just at the centre of it all, their scent fresh in the warm air of the room.  
Claire sat down as Jamie poured her a glass of wine and touched his wrist lightly.  
“Thank you for this, it’s a wonderful surprise.”  
Jamie glanced down at her and smiled slightly, handing her the glass  
“Weel, Brianna suggested that ye may like a date-night of some sort and I dinna ken what tradition is for such a thing, but as she described it I did remember at Leoch when ye would bring me a lunch to the stables. It was no’ proper courting, but it was the part o’ the day I looked forward to the most.”  
He blushed slightly and chuckled to himself  
“Ye ken how I am wi’ food, aye? But it got to be so that I didna care a fig what was in those wee baskets ye brought, I just wanted ye company for those few minutes. Ye could ha’ served me grass and I’d ha’ been happy as a lamb.”  
Claire laughed, remembering her own excitement at being allowed to go to Jamie armed with a basket of bread and cheese, under the pretence of needing to examine his arm.  
“I looked forward to our lunchtimes too.”  
“Ye did? Weel I thought ye might have but it’s nice to ken for sure.”  
Jamie grinned sitting down opposite her at the table, raising his glass  
“Slainte”  
“Do dheagh shlàinte”  
Claire answered automatically before raising an eyebrow at her husband  
“And what made you think I did?”  
“Weel Sassenach, I may ha’ been a pure and virgin lad when we wed, but I had seen plenty o’ lasses wi’ that same flush to their cheek and debauched glint in their eye…”  
He caught the little tomato Claire launched at him and popped it into his mouth, chewing happily.  
“If I was flushed it was due to the cold weather…”  
“Och aye! And the wee twinkle in those whiskey eyes was no doubt the wind!”  
Jamie teased, rolling his eyes and Claire snorted, watching him from under lowered lashes  
“All Scot’s have wind fit to make one’s eyes water, why should I have expected you to be different?”  
Jamie laughed loudly and raised his glass again  
“Aye, weel after what Brianna said I was thinking how I ne’er repaid ye kindness.”  
“You’ve made me lunch before!”  
Jamie nodded and his smile softened, warming her like the sun  
“But not special lunches, not as special as those at Leoch were to me.”  
Claire tilted her head and looked at her husband. Jamie straightened and met her gaze, enjoying the feel of her eyes on him, studying him without it being for a medical procedure for once.  
“I love you Jamie Fraser.”  
She said finally, smiling slightly and Jamie blushed with pleasure. He never doubted Claire’s love for him but she seldom said it so bluntly, and certainly not across the dinner table. They were normally in bed when she uttered the words…  
He cleared his throat hastily, not wanting to distract himself.  
“I love ye too. Now I believe ye must eat before anything else, and then I am to think of an activity ye will enjoy and do that wi’ ye and then …”  
Claire laughed and began to butter a bread roll  
“I can think of one or two and I’m fairly sure you’ll enjoy them too.”  
Jamie shook his head and pointed a finger at her  
“Aye, and I ken weel what sort o’ thing ye have in mind Mrs Fraser but Brianna tells me that a date-night must have a mutual activity and I get the feelin’ it is meant to be a pure one…”  
“Purer than the love between man and wife?”  
Claire countered, watching with amusement the struggle of desire vs the original plan play out across his features.  
“I take ye point but perhaps we could at least go for a walk?”  
His voice was slightly strangled and Claire giggled  
“Of course, and should I bring a chaperone?”  
“No Sassenach.”  
Jamie said dryly and gave her a look that suggested chaperone or not, she would pay for this teasing soon enough. Claire stood and walked around the table to him, sitting herself on his lap and pressing a small piece of cheese into his mouth with the tip of her finger.  
“This really is the loveliest surprise Jamie, thank you.”  
“I’m glad ye like it lass.”  
He nuzzled his face into her neck and Claire tipped her head back appreciatively  
“What if date-night hadn’t started yet?”  
“Hmmmm?”  
“We could work up an appetite?”  
She wrapped her fingers in the long auburn lengths of Jamie’s hair and pulled him gently up, looking into his eyes and trailing one hand down his back, making him shiver.  
“Aye, we could at that.”  
He smiled and stood her up, before leaning forward and gathering her over his shoulder as he stood.  
“Jamie!”  
Claire shrieked, dissolving into giggles as he carried her towards the stairs, his left hand sliding up her leg.  
“Jamie stop! Your back!”  
“My back is just fine mo chridhe, other parts o’ me however are aching something fierce see to them and we can get back to our date, aye?”  
Claire swept her hair back and watched her indoor picnic gradually fade from view as the made their way up the stairs and gave it a cheery wave as it disappeared.  
“Alright.”  
“Good. Ye ken, I always wished to do this in the stables at Leoch. Ne’er thought I’d get the chance to carry ye away from a basket o’ cheese and bread yet here I am!”  
“Lucky you!”  
Claire laughed and heard Jamie’s answering chuckle  
“Och aye Sassenach. I am a lucky man.”


End file.
